Impulse variance control for spacecraft autonomous rendezvous with an observer-based approach

This paper addresses the problem of impulse variance control for spacecraft autonomous rendezvous with poles constraint and limited-thrust. The classical Clohessy-Wiltshire equation is employed to describe the relative dynamic model, where the magnitude of uncertainty of the angle velocity is described as the model uncertainty of the dynamic equation. The impulse orbital manoeuvre problem is treated as a stabilization problem of a hybrid system, where the switching behaviour describes the impulse phenomenon of the controller. An observer-based control strategy is developed to solve the stabilization problem in the presences of parameter uncertainty, poles constraint, variance constraint and limited-thrust. A sufficient condition for the existence of the proposed observer-based state feedback gain is provided in terms of linear matrix inequalities approach. Finally, a numerical example is established to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed control approach.